a girl's best friend
by wilted flame
Summary: — it's hard to break a five hundred-year-old habit, and sometimes if she pretends hard enough, she could still sense a little bit of the lingering magic hidden behind the dazzling blue jewels. / [Katherine-centric, spoilers for S5.]


**A/N:** I have a bad habit of writing drabbles (if they can even be called that) at 3 AM and it needs to stop. Like wow this isn't even worth publishing but at this hour I don't have any ducks left to give, so here, enjoy. Sorry for all the errors, I wrote this in like fifteen minutes and haven't even bothered to proof-read, (which is probably something I _should_ make a habit of doing).

* * *

_Men grow cold_  
_As girls grow old,_  
_And we all lose our charms in the end._

_But square-cut or pear-shaped,_  
_These rocks don't lose their shape._  
_Diamonds are a girl's best friend._

][

"You still wear your daylight bracelet?"

The sudden question causes Katherine to cease playing with the Lapis-lazuli charms hanging off the white-gold chain donned on her thin wrist. Her analytical cat-like brown eyes glance up at Caroline through a layer of liner and mascara-coated lashes, and within a millisecond, she's already masking her true feelings with a nonchalant facade. Pretending has gotten both easier and harder for her as a human, but over five-hundred years of conniving and manipulating and deceiving has proven that she's more than capable of snatching an Oscar from any top-tier actor in the business. Dulled emotions are easier to suppress, but more difficult to forget, and drowning her sorrows in vodka can only do so much.

"What can I say? It goes with _everything_, and I'm a fan of recycling. Just because it's lost its purpose, doesn't mean it still has no use." She lifts her bare shoulders in a casual shrug as the words fall out of her mouth so easily, so carefully put together, as though she's spent all night reciting them, practicing how to enunciate each specific word, when in reality _she's_ not even sure why she's still kept her little antique piece of jewelry.

Caroline's inquisitive gaze disappears, and she continues to babble about something concerning her evil biology professor or Elena's toxic relationship with Damon, or some other shit Katherine's already heard a dozen times before (One of the perks of being human that she's long forgotten: it's so much easier to tune things out when your hearing isn't so sensitive). Her perfectly manicured fingers go back to playing with the deep blue charms, and if Katherine pretends hard enough, she can still sense a little bit of the magic left behind.

A part of what she told Caroline is true. Five-hundred years of changing fashions and looks, and Lapis-lazuli never failed to match whatever gown or suit or costume she put on that decade. She'd spent centuries adapting and never once did she leave the house without it on her neck or wrist or finger. Granted, she didn't have much of a choice then, but why put a stop to a timeless fashion statement?

A nagging, annoying part of her is scared that if she cuts off the chain, her status and place in the world becomes more concrete, more permanent. She'd been dead-set on cheating a way out of this fate, (because Katherine Pierce is a survivor, and there was _always_ a way), but when her last chance to survived died along with Qetsiyah, all her hopes diminished, and the only reminder of her past life was the ashes of a 19th century portrait and a flimsy little bauble hanging off her wrist.

She'd made excuses for herself, most of them centered around the fact that she'd need a daylight bracelet once she was immortal again, because heaven forbid that Katherine Pierce becomes anything less than that for a prolonged period of time. The bracelet held onto the hope that this situation was temporary. That she wasn't always going to be fragile and weak and frail and inferior. She'd come out on top once again, someday, and when she did, she'd be accessorizing her outfit with Lapis-lazuli.

As long as she had that bracelet on, she still had (false) hope.


End file.
